The present disclosure relates to the art of vessel cleaning devices and, more particularly, to a detonation combustor cleaning device for dislodging debris from inner surfaces of vessels.
Industrial boilers operate by using a heat source to create steam from water or another working fluid, which can then be used to drive a turbine in order to supply power. Conventionally, the heat source is a combustor that burns a fuel in order to generate heat, which is then transferred into the working fluid via a heat exchanger, such as a fluid conducting tube or pipe. Burning fuel may generate residues that often are left behind forming a buildup on surfaces of associated ducting or heat exchanger. This buildup can lead to performance degrades related to an increase in pressure drop, reduced fuel efficiency, and damage to mechanical components. These performance degrades can eventually lead to costly planned or unplanned outages. Periodic removal or prevention of such buildup maintains the operational efficiency of such boiler systems. In the past, the buildup was removed by directing pressurized steam, water jets, acoustic waves, and mechanical hammering onto the inner surfaces of the combustor or heat exchanger. However, such systems are often times costly to maintain and not always effective. That is, the effectiveness of such devices will vary depending on location and use.
More recently, detonative combustion devices are used to remove the buildup. Detonative combustion devices that burn customer friendly fuels, such as natural gas and propane, tend to require large detonation chamber diameters and lengths, which, in turn, require a relatively large installation footprint. Moreover, in some cases, such detonation devices require oxygen enrichment in order to create the detonations. Flexible fuels, or fuels having a large detonation cell size and high direct initiation energy, such as natural gas and propane, do not burn properly in existing systems without the addition of some amount of pre oxygen. More specifically, when using flexible fuels in existing detonative combustions devices, flame propagation velocity is less than desired, resulting in little or no cleaning ability of the resulting combustion process.